Category: Words of Wisdom

In peace I will both lay myself down and sleep,
for you, the LORD alone, make me live in safety.
-Psalm 4, WEBBE

When you get tired from your trials, my friend, I pray you may find a way to rest, I pray you do not give up.

Don’t think so far ahead. Don’t fret!

Be where you are, stay where you need to be. Think only of your troubles today.

For there is a way with things that we cannot control. And there is a way with things that make them turn out well in the end. Though we may not know how. Though we may not know when.

So when you get tired from your trials, my friend, I pray you may find time to rest, I pray that you don’t just quit.

God has a way to make things better in the end. And for now all you need is to rest and to trust Him, my friend.

“Rest is not idleness, and to lie sometimes on the grass under trees on a summer’s day, listening to the murmur of the water, or watching the clouds float across the sky, is by no means a waste of time.” – John Lubbock, The Use Of Life

The Day is Done

The day is done, and the darkness
Falls from the wings of Night,
As a feather is wafted downward
From an eagle in his flight.

I see the lights of the village
Gleam through the rain and the mist,
And a feeling of sadness comes o’er me
That my soul cannot resist:

A feeling of sadness and longing,
That is not akin to pain,
And resembles sorrow only
As the mist resembles the rain.

Come, read to me some poem,
Some simple and heartfelt lay,
That shall soothe this restless feeling,
And banish the thoughts of day.

Not from the grand old masters,
Not from the bards sublime,
Whose distant footsteps echo
Through the corridors of Time.

For, like strains of martial music,
Their mighty thoughts suggest
Life’s endless toil and endeavor;
And to-night I long for rest.

Read from some humbler poet,
Whose songs gushed from his heart,
As showers from the clouds of summer,
Or tears from the eyelids start;

Who, through long days of labor,
And nights devoid of ease,
Still heard in his soul the music
Of wonderful melodies.

Such songs have power to quiet
The restless pulse of care,
And come like the benediction
That follows after prayer.

Then read from the treasured volume
The poem of thy choice,
And lend to the rhyme of the poet
The beauty of thy voice.

And the night shall be filled with music,
And the cares, that infest the day,
Shall fold their tents, like the Arabs,
And as silently steal away.
– Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

“Short cuts make long delays.” – J.R.R. Tolkien, The Fellowship of the Ring

Sometimes, all we want are the shortcuts in life. We want things to be done quickly even if we use means that would otherwise defeat the very principles we wanted to uphold in the first place. We convince ourselves that the end would indeed justify the means.

But what we fail to realize is that by going through the tedious yet straight path, we are gaining something else. We gain courage and strength we otherwise would not have found. We gain perseverance, a virtue that is often necessary for victory, true victory. And quite often, if we are able to pursue along this path, we find surprises too, wonderful ones we wouldn’t have found or discovered had we been content to walk through the mere shortcuts in life.

“Enter in by the narrow gate; for wide is the gate and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many are those who enter in by it. How narrow is the gate, and restricted is the way that leads to life! Few are those who find it.” – Matthew 7, WEBBE

“We are what we love. If we love God, in whose image we were created, we discover ourselves in him and we cannot help being happy: we have already achieved something of the fullness of being for which we were destined in our creation. If we love everything else but God, we contradict the image born in our very essence, and we cannot help being unhappy, because we are living a caricature of what we are meant to be.” – Thomas Merton, A Book of Hours

Sometimes I wonder what makes people do terrible things that seem obviously evil. Why do it? For it would seem even without religious laws against such deeds, the natural conscience of man would feel repulsed in doing them.

Maybe there is really an influence of original sin in us all, and this is like a beast just waiting to be released with all its tendencies to evil. Many times, all it needs is just a license from something or someone to say that it’s alright, that it can even be good to follow these instincts. And the beast is unleashed, seeking the ruin of others and eventually, the ruin of self.

On the other hand, I also believe that there lies buried beneath all these, the original image of our humanity, a humanity made in God’s own image. This is our truly natural state, the core of that Divine spark within us. And this humanity is what helps us recognize the beauty of goodness, compassion and every other virtue that lifts us beyond the instincts of the beast. This is our true self, and this is what enables us to realize that it is not the beast that we want to win, it is not the beast we want to become.

And so there will be two forces throughout man’s history that will always struggle with one another. The one that thinks it is the beast that must be set free. And the other that remembers its true self and its divine origin, that realizes we can never find our truest desires as long as we succumb to the instincts of the beast.

God said, “Let’s make man in our image, after our likeness. Let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the birds of the sky, and over the livestock, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.” God created man in his own image. In God’s image he created him; male and female he created them. – Genesis 1, WEBBE

“Do not be afraid. Do not be satisfied with mediocrity. Put out into the deep and let down your nets for a catch.”- Pope John Paul II

Don’t ever think that the good you do is futile. It is not. It has shaped you, it has helped you become who you are. It is still moulding you to become even better than before.

Don’t ever think that because you see you no fruit yet, that there will be none. Because there will be. And there are fruits now, ripening within you. There will be other fruits, and all because of what you’ve done.

Don’t ever think that all is lost because you’re alone. You are not. The Lord who sees everything sees what you do, and when you can no longer walk, He will carry you!

But I said, “I have laboured in vain.
I have spent my strength in vain for nothing;
yet surely the justice due to me is with the LORD,
and my reward with my God.”
-Isaiah 49, WEBBE

“We must accept finite disappointment, but never lose infinite hope.”
– Martin Luther King Jr.

In that cold night, may you see a glimmer of hope, some little light to see you through. I hope you find enough to carry you through the darkest hours before dawn. And may you keep hanging on to the very last moment of trial.

May a candle’s flame warm your shaking hands. May a single star pierce through the thickest clouds for you. That you may not be lost, and that you may yet say a prayer from your heart.

We may not always be blessed with sunshine. And many are the days without mirth. Yet even then, may you find that all is not yet lost. Even in the throes of seeming defeat, there is yet a way to win.

LORD, how my adversaries have increased!
Many are those who rise up against me.
Many there are who say of my soul,
“There is no help for him in God.”
But you, LORD, are a shield around me,
my glory, and the one who lifts up my head.
I cry to the LORD with my voice,
and he answers me out of his holy hill.
-Psalm 3, WEBBE